LONDON (IPS) - A Dangerous Delusion is the work of one of Britain’s most brilliant political commentators, Peter Oborne, and an Irish physicist, David Morrison, who has written powerfully about the misleading of British public and parliamentary opinion in the run-up to the 2003 Iraq War.

This book will infuriate neoconservatives, Likudniks and members of the Saudi royal family but enlighten all who struggle with what to think about the claim that Iran’s nuclear programme threatens the survival of Israel, the security of Arab states in the Persian Gulf, and global peace. [P] JAPANESE TEXT VERSION

UNITED NATIONS (IPS) - A group of about 20 “eminent persons” is to be tasked with an unenviable job: convince eight recalcitrant countries to join the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

The eight holdouts – China, Egypt, India, Iran, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan and the United States – have not given any indication of possible ratifications, leaving the treaty in limbo. [P] GERMAN | JAPANESE TEXT VERSIONPDF

MOSCOW (IPS) - A Kremlin compromise on nuclear disarmament looks as far away as ever as Russian president Vladimir Putin and his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama use their countries’ strained relations to bolster their own domestic political agendas, experts say.

Obama’s call, during a speech in Berlin in June 2013, for a dramatic reduction in the world’s nuclear weapons had led to hopes that there would be cuts in world nuclear arsenals on the agenda of a potential nuclear summit in 2016, and gave extra impetus to what will be the first-ever high level meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on nuclear disarmament in September 2013. [P] JAPANESE TEXT VERSIONPDF

UNITED NATIONS (IPS) - When the United Nations commemorates the International Day Against Nuclear Tests later this week, the lingering question in the minds of most anti-nuclear activists is whether or not the existing moratorium on testing will continue to be honoured – or occasionally violated with impunity.

SYDNEY (IDN) - Even as the nuclear-armed countries continue to amass new warheads and build and modernise ballistic missiles, bombers and submarines to launch them, the campaign for nuclear abolition is growing from strength to strength. [P] CHINESE TEXT VERSIONPDF | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF

BERLIN (IDN) - Preparations are afoot for a new, and perhaps a promising, round of talks between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany (P5+1) over Tehran’s nuclear energy program. According to Press TV, Kazakhstan is willing to host the negotiations for the third time in succession this year.

NEW DELHI - Some of the Nuclear Suppliers Group members are expressing unnecessary apprehensions regarding India’s membership. Unlike China, India has a track record of complying with obligations of any treaty or agreement it signs.

The 2013 Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) plenary meeting in Prague, from June 13 to 14, assumed significance in the context of the on-going crises relating to Iran and North Korea as well the legitimacy crisis faced by the group because of the Chinese proliferation behaviour. Equally important challenges before the NSG have been the advancement in global nuclear technology as well as the expansion of its membership whereby its goals and objectives are promoted not compromised.

UNITED NATIONS (IPS) - The growing political rift between the United States and Russia triggered by the granting of temporary asylum to U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden, who is now holed up in Moscow, is threatening to further undermine relations between the two superpowers at the United Nations. [P] ITALIAN | JAPANESE TEXT VERSIONPDF | PORTUGUESE | SPANISH

WASHINGTON (IPS) - Newly published recollections by the former French ambassador to Iran suggest that Iran was not running a covert nuclear weapons programme that it then decided to halt in late 2003, as concluded by U.S. intelligence in 2007.

Ambassador Francois Nicoullaud recounted conversations with high-ranking Iranian officials indicating that Tehran’s then nuclear policy chief – and now president-elect – Hassan Rouhani did not know what research projects relating to nuclear weapons had been carried out over the years. [P] JAPANESE TEXT VERSIONPDF